Boy Scouts sex abuse claims may be largest ever
As deadline looms, numbers are growing
As a Nov. 16 deadline looms for abuse survivors to come forward to make claims in the Boy Scouts of America bankruptcy, a judge’s ruling could allow the case to become the largest-ever child sexual abuse case against a single national organization.
Late last week, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Laurie Selber Silverstein allowed the Coalition of Abused Scouts for Justice to join mediation discussions, giving a group representing 28,000 clients a say in any future settlement.
So far, 7,300 accusers represented by the 10 law firms in the coalition have signed consent forms allowing the attorneys to negotiate on their behalf. More are expected to sign before the deadline to file proof of their allegations.
That means tens of thousands of accusers, who are considered creditors in the bankruptcy proceeding, could vote on any settlement with the Boy Scouts.
“In the end it comes down to ... the votes of the survivors, so if you have the majority of the survivors, your votes can confirm a plan,” said Philadelphia attorney Ken Rothweiler, who as part of the group Abused in Scouting represents 13,000 claimants. “Anybody that has the most claimants, it puts them in a very advantageous position.”
Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy in federal court in Delaware in February amid mounting liability from abuse cases, estimating it faced 275 lawsuits in state and federal courts around the country plus another 1,400 potential claims – a number dwarfed by activity in the months since.
In recent years, thousands also have said they were abused by by Catholic priests. Those cases have been filed against individual dioceses, obscuring how many claims the church has faced.
In initial filings, Boy Scouts were the ones who proposed the creation of the Victims Compensation Trust, but the organization has not yet suggested how much money would be set aside for it.
The bankruptcy process is ill-suited to deal with these types of cases, said Marci Hamilton, chief executive officer of CHILD USA, a nonprofit think tank that works to prevent child abuse.
“The goal of federal Chapter 11 bankruptcy is to be able to reorganize your assets to put a lid on any kind of future claims by people you currently owe,” she said. “It never was intended for child sex abuse.”
But Hamilton said it has become the “go-to model for organizations with large numbers of victims,” like the Catholic Church.
Legal battles over the coalition were just the latest in a string of skirmishes over the past months.
The coalition faced opposition from an unlikely combination of the Boy Scouts’ insurers and the Torts Claimant Committee, a group of nine survivors of child sexual abuse within Boy Scouts appointed in March.
Insurers and lawyers for the committee argued the coalition didn’t meet financial disclosure rules and questioned the makeup and structure of the coalition and whom it represents. In hearings, both groups argued against including the coalition in mediation, saying the interests of survivors already are represented by the claimant committee.
“What the insurance companies and the TCC are responding to is the number of victims here,” Sunni Beville of Brown Rudnick, the firm representing the coalition, argued last week.
In allowing the coalition to join the
case, Silverstein noted that she could think of many reasons for the increase in claims, including the approaching deadline, a national advertising blitz by attorneys and a less stigmatizing environment to come forward.
The ruling comes after months of disagreement between parties representing former Scouts who say they were abused and who may be entitled to compensation.
This summer, some of the state court counsels who formed the coalition began to clash with the Torts Claimant Committee and its representative, James Stang, whose previous abuse cases include the Catholic Church and USA Gymnastics. The two camps disagreed on the role of Boy Scouts’ local councils in the bankruptcy and whether accusers from states that have done away with statutes of limitations or created “look back” windows should be given preference.
The committee objected to the coalition’s motion to enter the case, saying the coalition “is nothing more than a marketing term that was concocted” by law firms “who were unhappy they could not control the Tort Claimants' Committee.”
The national scouting organization has been mired in civil litigation since a landmark case in 2010 that resulted in $19.9 million in damages, the largest ever for a single individual against the Boy Scouts of America. That case triggered the release of more than 20,000 confidential documents.
The records named more than 1,000 banned volunteers, revealing that the organization had kept track of suspected and known abusers and failed to consistently report them to police.
Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy in February amid mounting liability from abuse cases, estimating it faced 275 lawsuits in state and federal courts plus another 1,400 potential claims.